A worsening macroeconomic climate and the collapse of industry giants like FTX and Terra have weighed on the price of bitcoin this year.
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The cryptocurrency market suffered heavy selling overnight on Saturday amid an unprecedented Iranian crisis. Drone and missile attack against Israel.
bitcoin fell about 8% on Saturday night when US officials confirmed the attack was taking place. Digital currencies were some of the only risk assets trading over the weekend and the drop was seen as an initial reaction to escalating tensions in the Middle East.
Bitcoin had been trading around $70,000 on Saturday night, but fell to below $62,000, according to data from the Bitstamp exchange. By Sunday morning it had recovered and was trading above $64,000. Other currencies such as ether also experienced strong sales, up to 10% in some cases.
The bitcoin selloff was the steepest in more than a year, according to Bloomberg, with the currency reaching new records recently amid inflows into US spot bitcoin ETFs that continue to drive the cryptocurrency's price action.
In the Middle East, overnight events It marked the first case of a direct attack against Israel from Iranian territory. Israel said it had identified 300 "threats of various types" and eliminated "99%" of those targeting Israeli soil.
The barrage of drones and missiles on Israel was reportedly in response to an alleged Israeli strike that killed senior Iranian officials in Syria.
The Iranian currency fell to a record low of 705,000 rials/USD in the unofficial market around 10:30 a.m. local time on Sunday, according to data from currency monitoring site Bonbast.
The emblematic index of the Tel Aviv Stock Exchange, the TA-35, It was down 0.38% at 10:23 am London time.
โCNBC's Ruxandra Iordache contributed to this article.
